The Catholic Church in Error

[evangelicalhumanist]

Originally published July 15, 2005

After the same-sex marriage bill passed through the Canadian Parliament in June, 2005, suggestions started being made that action should be taken against those churches that continue to lobby against it. This particularly comes from a group called "Equal Marriage." At the time, the Evangelical Humanist wrote (to the National Post), that churches have the right to define marriage within their religion as it pleases them to, and that efforts to punish religions (through removal of tax exemptions, for example) were wrong-headed. As we said in the paper, “leave the churches alone.”

For the record, EH believes that every religion, and every member of every religion, has the perfect right to articulate its views publicly, and even the right to attempt to use moral suasion to encourage people to do what it believes is the right thing.

Since then, however, the Catholic Church has initiated action against two of its members who spoke and voted in favour of the bill. NDP MP Charlie Angus was refused communion in his congregation, and his party peer, Joe Comartin, was removed from his long-accustomed role of teaching marriage classes in his church. This is no longer moral suasion. This is overt punishment taken against duly elected members of the Canadian Parliament.

The church has explained that these actions were taken against men who had acted against the faith, by attempting to redefine a sacrament. Unfortunately, the church is very wrong in this instance. While a religious marriage, occuring within the church, may rightly be described as a sacrament, civil marriage, which is the sole concern of the secular government, may not. This is especially true when non-religious people wish to be married without having a religious interpretation of their union imposed upon them. It is also true when a divorced Catholic wishes to remarry. The church explicitly denies such people the right to the sacrament of Catholic marriage, and they are thus forced to join in a civil one.

Therefore, what the Catholic Church is doing is attempting to impose its religious doctrine upon the Parliament of Canada. It has been explicit in stating that the punishment meeted out to Mr. Comartin, for example, will not be lifted until he comes to his senses and changes his vote. This it must not be allowed to get away with. Not all Canadians are Christians, let alone Catholics. Many are not religious at all, and have no intention of being governed by the clergy.

Now, therefore, the Evangelical Humanist has been forced to amend its stance. Our position is now that we should leave all churches, with the exception of the Catholic Church, alone. The Catholic Church, for having engaged in an act specifically designed to influence a political outcome using more than moral suasion, should have its tax exempt status revoked.

[MacAgy]

I think the Roman Catholic Church should be very quite on this matter.
Has not the Pope just admitted to the rampant abuse of young boys by the the fathers of the chuch.

Is this not a perfrct example of on calling the kettle black?

[Mirage]

Well, I agree with you that the Church should probably not accuse healthy committed gay adult partners of wickedness when they have systematically in the past ignored pedophiles within their own ranks. They should fix their internal problems, and the recent Papal decree that homosexuals should not become priests will not solve the problem. I do need to say that I hope you are not under the impression that men who abuse boys are all homosexual. Most abusers of boys in North America are married men, and their wives often never suspect because the marital sex life often appears normal to the spouse. Homosexuality is not a mental disorder and is not itself particularly associated with higher levels of pedophilia. Pedophilia is a mental disorder. Many pedophiles are more fixated on age than which sex the child is. Unfortunately, society is generally more upset when boys are molested (by men), and seemingly more upset when girls are killed than when boys are. Some pedophiles do abuse only one sex or the other, but in those cases, the sex they abuse doesn't always match their sexual orientation toward adults. It is true that some people with mental illnesses associated with criminal sexual compulsions do become priests because they hope the vow of celibacy will magically stop them from acting on their urges. Unfortunately, it generally doesn't, and even more unfortunately, there is no known cure or treatment for pedophilia other than keeping them away from unsupervised contact with potential victims entirely. What the church should do at the very minimum is keep anyone showing warning signs of having this compulsion far away from any children. There often are warning signs. If they have already committed crimes or attempted crimes, the Church should of course hand them over to the law and mental health authorities.

[Baruch]

Earlier, I think in the last 70s, the Catholic Church forced the resignations of Catholic clergy who were serving in elected civil positions, Congress for example. The theory being that they could not both serve their constituency and serve Catholic dogma, since not all of their constituents are Catholic (and thus in theory subject to the rule of Catholic clergy). Discipline over clergy being more stringent than that over laity. It is hard for me to say, what would be proper in this case. I think it was a mistake for the Catholic authorities to establish a quid pro quo, if that is what it is. Excommunication is not something that the Canadian legal authorities have any interest. Clearly the two are not Catholic laity in good standing. The Catholic Church should probably have arranged, should they choose to take it up, a non-political penance, which could lead to readmittance to the Catholic Church. I suspect it would be a further complication, had these individuals been representatives to Quebec, rather than Ottawa, since the relevant law might be different, in terms of allowed clerical influence (is Quebec similar to France, is it Gallican, preserving some form of the two swords arrangement?).

Shalom

[evangelicalhumanist]

I suspect it would be a further complication, had these individuals been representatives to Quebec, rather than Ottawa, since the relevant law might be different, in terms of allowed clerical influence (is Quebec similar to France, is it Gallican, preserving some form of the two swords arrangement?).

Yes, in fact Quebec, for internal provincial purposes (marriage, inheritance, education, etc.) has as its fundamental law the Quebec Civil Code, which is quite similar in structure to the French Civil (or Napoleonic) Code.

[Baruch]

So quote for me, since you are Canadian, how that makes institutional religion (particularly the RCC) different in Quebec vs the rest of Canada? Thanks.

Shalom

[evangelicalhumanist]

So quote for me, since you are Canadian, how that makes institutional religion (particularly the RCC) different in Quebec vs the rest of Canada? Thanks.

Shalom

Well, in fact, it isn't really different any more, although it used to be. Up until the Quiet Revolution(1960-1966) there were aspects of the Quebec civil law that assigned, for example, education and health to the Church -- the Catholic Church. It was only during this period that the Quebec government actually created ministries of Education and Health. At the same time, the public service grew and there was much investment, especially in public education and provincial infrastructure.

Oh, and the government allowed unionization of the civil service. Gasp!

Previous to this, Quebec was very much the creature of the Church, and the chief values of the society may be what Michel Brunet called “les trois dominantes de la pensée canadienne-française: l’agriculturisme, le messianisme et l’anti-étatisme” [the three main components of French Canadian thought: agriculturalism, anti-statism and messianism].

You will appreciate, I think, how changes of this order has in fact made Quebec (still largely Catholic) among the most secular of Canadians. Les Quebecois are the biggest supporters of same-sex marriage, of social democracy, and so on. Could this be a "pendulum effect," likely to swing back? Oh, probably. But it hasn't happened yet.

[Baruch]

Definitely between the Pit And The Pendulum ... guess it took Trudeau to finally bring Fraternite, Egalite, Liberte to the Quebecois? Thanks for the description.

Shalom